[PUP] Fwd: [kensblog] Update # 19 - Fubar in Ensenada

[John Ford]

Begin forwarded message:

> Today was a day of site seeing, relaxation and last minute repairs
> in Ensenada.
>
> Sans Souci is at the Ensenada Marina, along with only one other
> Fubar boat; Samurai, a Nordhavn 64. We felt a little isolated from
> the group, but when we received a call saying we could move to the
> Cruiseport Marina with everyone else, I had to decline. At first, I
> wanted to move, but we simply couldnt find the time. During our
> cruise here from San Diego, we made a list of projects for our
> time in port. The list wasnt exceptionally long, but it was plenty
> long enough to keep us busy.
>
> First up on the list was to figure out the air conditioning on the
> boat. Its a long story which I dont want to bore you with, but
> weve been fiddling with the air conditioning since August. Perhaps
> for many reading this it sounds silly to be focused on air
> conditioning, but we have two good excuses.
>
> 1)      My dad is along, and I want him to be comfortable. The guest
> staterooms on Sans Souci are low in the water. When under way we
> have to close the port holes, and it can get hot and stuffy.
> 2)      Roberta and I will be cruising, after the rally, south to
> Costa Rica. It will be hot and sticky If we do not solve the air
> conditioning the trip will be ruined. Well still get there, but
> frankly speaking, we boat because it is fun to boat. The destination
> isnt as important as the experience of getting there. A few years
> back, we spent an extremely hot summer in the south of france, with
> no air conditioning, and yes, perhaps this makes us wimps, but it
> just wasnt that much fun.
>
> Dont ask me what our problem has been, because I cant really tell
> you. And, Im not pointing the finger at Nordhavn. The fact is that
> we had a cruising schedule we wanted to meet, and our schedule
> created a hard date when we needed to take delivery of the boat. We
> knew the air conditioning was not fully operational, and took
> delivery of the boat anyhow. We were headed to the Pacific NW, a
> place where air conditioning is an optional feature. My focus was
> on the mission critical systems, and for NW cruising, air
> conditioning isnt on the list.  I remember buying our first home in
> Seattle and asking the realtor if the home had air conditioning.
> Why? she said.
>
> Our most recent problem has had to do with the electrical system on
> the boat. When the air conditioning starts up, there is a power
> surge that kills our generators and wreaks havoc with the electrical
> system on the boat. More than one technician has tried to solve our
> problems, each with some degree of success. Weve been marching
> slowly toward the finish line, and my goal for today was only to
> figure out why the power requirements are so steep. Whenever we run
> the air conditioning, even in severely limited usage, it clobbers
> our electrical system.
>
> After hours of experimenting we solved this particular problem. The
> air conditioning system has a feature we really didnt understand.
> Its a chilled water system. For those not familiar with chilled
> water systems, such as myself, its a really simple concept: Water
> is constantly circulated throughout the boat.  As the water passes
> through the various staterooms, air is blown across a pipe holding
> the water,  into the rooms. The system is simple, and consists of
> only a few basic parts. There is a chiller, actually four chillers,
> which can either chill the water in the water loop which runs
> around the boat, or heat it. There is a pump to move water through
> the loop. There are fans in the rooms (called air handlers) to blow
> air past the water loop into the room, and finally, there is a pump
> to take sea water in and use it to cool the chiller as it does its
> job.
>
> Our project for the day involved turning on and off chillers, while
> measuring the electrical current each chiller took, and measuring
> the current from each of the air handlers, and trying to find the
> culprit that was swallowing all of the electricity. And, to my great
> surprise, we were rewarded for our efforts. Heres the quick story
> as I understand it: Our air handlers have a feature which allows
> them to blow hot air, whether or not cold water is circulating
> through the loop. I dont know the official name, but I call them
> heat strips. Weve had a lot of guests on the boat. Those of you who
> have boats may be able to relate to this  but, guests dont always
> think about the consequences when they push buttons. As the boat has
> been configured, a guest randomly pushing buttons on the remotes
> could easily trigger the heat strips. An air handler by itself
> doesnt use much electricity, but an air handler with an active heat
> strip, can be a major current draw. Multiply this by a few
> staterooms and you can easily choke a generator.
>
> This set me to thinking about how to idiot proof the system. I was
> convinced that there must be some way to fix the system such that
> guests couldnt accidentally kill my electrical system. This meant
> spending the afternoon reading electrical manuals, and finally
> reprogramming all of the remotes around the boat.
>
> This is the part of the cruising lifestyle that has surprised me
> most.  Prior to owning a boat, I was strictly a computer guy.
> Mechanical things scared the heck out of me. Today, I found myself
> measuring current to circulating pumps, and making up spreadsheets
> showing current draws  on different parts of the system.  Dealing
> with electrical systems, plumbing systems, diesel engines, and other
> mechanical devices, has become a part of my life.
>
> Im saying this poorly, so allow me to start over. In the old days,
> I thought all one had to do to be a great captain was to be able to
> park a boat. As time marches on, Im discovering that if you really
> want to cruise long distances in your boat, you need to develop a
> lot more skills than just being able to back a boat into a tight
> parking place. Yesterday when the shore power was doing funny
> things, I had my multi-meter out. Today I was talking amps and volts
> all day. We also had some mechanical projects today. We removed a
> door to fix some rubber stripping that was falling out. We (actually
> Jeff) replaced a water pump on a generator that had failed. Im not
> claiming Im any good at any of these things. My only point is that
> people underestimate the complexity of running one of these boats,
> and the number of different systems and skill sets required. Boating
> can be trickier than it looks
>
> OK. Enough of the boring stuff, now back to the Fubar discussion
>
> My only Fubar-ish activity today was to participate in a meeting of
> all the Fubar captains. We discussed the major passage which begins
> early tomorrow morning. We will be running 290 miles non-stop making
> this the longest run of the entire rally.  This is a serious run,
> and one which will require 35 to 45 hours for most of the boats.
> Some of the crews have never run around the clock.
>
> Rallys, as one might expect, have different personalities. My only
> previous rally experience was the Nordhavn cross Atlantic rally in
> 2004. Just as with this rally, prior to each leg, there is a
> captains meeting, at which the coming run is discussed. I remember
> the Captains meetings as intense and somewhat intimidating.
> Everything was planned down to the last detail. For this rally,
> things are much looser. The focus seems to be on what happens when
> you arrive, rather than the journey itself. On the Nordhavn rally,
> we planned out when we would leave, who was in our group, how we
> would communicate, and when we would communicate. It felt like a
> military operation. By comparison at the Fubar captains meeting
> tonight, things were much looser. When Bruce (our rally chair) was
> asked When do we depart his answer was: Back up from when you
> want to arrive, decide what speed you want to run at, and you will
> have your departure time. This is an absolutely correct answer to
> the question, but it left me feeling differently than I did on the
> Nordhavn rally. The boats arent being broken into groupings with
> team leaders. There was a question tonight about radio roll calls,
> and Im not sure Bruce really understood the question. He responded
> that he really didnt believe they were necessary. On the Nordhavn
> rally it was a big deal to know where every boat was, at least once
> per day.
>
> In a way it isnt fair to compare the two rallys. On the Atlantic
> crossing we were planning for 10 day passages across the Atlantic
> Ocean. Here we are discussing a 40 hour passage fairly close to
> land. My concern was primarily for those in the room for whom this
> was their first overnight passage. I happened to be speaking with
> one captain who mentioned that his longest cruise was across a lake.
> I expect he was understating his experience, but I also could tell
> this was a big event in his life. I dont know how many of the boats
> are making their first overnight ocean passage, and I cant tell you
> what the optimal format is for a rally. But, I can tell you that I
> personally miss the rigid discipline of the Nordhavn rally.
> Different strokes for different folks, as they say
>
> Some of this feeling is perhaps the differences in cruising in a
> rally with 18 boats, and a rally with 53 boats. On the Nordhavn
> rally we split the group into two sub-groupings of nine boats. This
> rally hasnt split us to smaller groups. There is a Nordhavn group,
> and ostensibly I am its leader, but weve never met as a group, and
> arent traveling together.
>
> Actually, the worst news of the day came when I asked Jeff, one of
> our crew here on Sans Souci, about Turtle Bay. Some of you may have
> gotten my blog from a few days ago where I sent out amazing pictures
> of blue skies and crystal blue water, taken by a friend who
> traversed this same route just last week. That vision of paradise
> has yet to emerge. Ensenada seems a nice city, but it has been cool
> since we have been here, and overcast. I want the Jimmy Buffet
> experience, and thought that wed find it in Turtle Bay. Jeff burst
> my bubble by saying that the pretty beaches, great fishing, blue
> water, etc didnt really start until south of Turtle Bay. Im hoping
> he is wrong. I want to find a beach to anchor off of, with warm
> water, where I can drop the tenders, get out the scuba gear, and
> relax in the sun.
>
> Before I close, I need to correct a couple of things from my report
> yesterday.
>
> 1)      Several people have written me to report that the Coral
> Marina, just north of Ensenada, has a normal fuel dock. I had sent
> out a picture of a boat being fueled via 55 gallon drums. I checked
> on this today, and there is indeed a fuel dock at Coral. My friend
> who went through here recently must not have discovered it. I asked
> Bruce why we werent fueling at it, and he said that we are using it
> to fuel part of the fleet, but that they had one fuel pump not
> working, and couldnt fuel the boats fast enough.
>
> 2)      I sent out a picture of the 28 non-Fubar boat next to mine,
> which had been headed to Guatemala and turned back. I spoke to the
> guy again today, and he was actually headed for Nicaragua! I had
> thought him eccentric when I spoke with him last night, but today
> I discovered that he was an interesting guy. He has a business in
> Nicaragua, and was serious about getting there. I asked what he
> would do now, and about fell off my chair at his response. He said
> he was going to ship his boat via Dockwise to Costa Rica and then
> work his way north to Nicaragua. In my mind I was thinking This is
> a 28 foot craft of dubious seaworthiness, why would you pay a
> fortune to put it on a freighter to Costa Rica? I struggled to find
> a politically correct way to ask this, and gave up and just asked
> the question. What else is there to do with the money? he
> responded.  I then tried to sell him on getting a full displacement
> trawler and twisted his arm to check out the various rally boats. We
> wound up talking for a while about Nicaragua, and my fears of
> cruising there. Well be there in February, and my current plan is
> to give it a wide berth. More on this when I have more time.
>
> This blog update is already overly long, and I have to get to sleep
> for our 6am departure tomorrow. Assuming I can get an internet
> connection, I will be reporting in from at sea.
>
> Thank you!
>
> Ken Williams
> Sans Souci, Nordhavn68.com
>
> PS If you are new to the blog, and want to catch up on prior blog
> entries, visit http://www.nordhavn68.com, and click on BLOG on the
> menu.
> ~-~-~-~-